Two of the largest Science Fairs are looking for you and your ideas. If you listen to the stories behind most science fair entries, there was something in their every day life that they wanted to fix. This ranges from their dog missing them when they were on vacation or not hearing music is a noisy classroom to trying to protect their town from a hurricane or their family from a disease.

If you come up with an idea and enter one of these contests, besides coming up with an great invention and learning a lot about math and science, you can also win some really nice prizes. You could win $25,000 or $50,000. Some prizes include all expense paid trip around the world to see amazing things like Lego Headquarters, CERN (particle collider), the Galapagos Islands, Google Headquarters or Costa Rica. One inventor will even get to job shadow a 3M engineer for a summer.

Even if you do not win any prizes, it will be an experience you never forget.

The Google Science Fair is accepting ideas. You can enter as an individual or as a team. Youth ages 13-18 can apply. Some of the previous finalist include helping those with hearing loss listen to music, anit-flu medicine, a battery-free flashlight, bio-plastics from a banana, and new signalling system for emergency vehicles.

There is also the 3M Young Scientist Competition for grades 5-8. The winner of last year's competition created a new kind of "sand bag" to save towns from hurricanes. Some of the finalists included a machine that allows you to talk to and feed your pet while you are away and better indoor cook stoves.

If you have not come up with any ideas for this year. Keep thinking about them so you can apply for next year's competitions.